Page 111 of Light Up The Night
I shake my head, smiling down at him, curls bouncing. "For one thing, I have nothing clean to put on."
"That's the reason, is it?" he asks, mischief and teasing on his face.
"No," I say. “That is not the only reason."
"Oh no?"
"No." I slip my hands under his shirt at the neck, biting my lip on a grin as I scour the hot skin of his neck and upper back. "I woke up afflicted with the most potent desire."
"Afflicted, were you?"
"Oh yes. Afflicted."
He tugs at the hem of the shirt I wear, freeing it from between my buttocks and his legs. "If it's an affliction, does that mean there's a cure?"
"Yes, certainly," I murmur, removing my hands so I can lift his shirt up and rip it off, toss it aside to the kitchen floor. "You."
"Me?"
"You are the only cure." I kiss him. “Thisis the cure." I roam his broad, hard shoulders, the bulge of his pectoral muscles, his thick arms. "Thisis the cure." Heat flames in my cheeks, but I feel nothing except need, bold and wild and fierce; I cup the hard wedge behind the cold metal of his zipper. "Thisis the cure."
"Fuck, baby," he growls, tearing his shirt off of me, leaving me naked. "You're a goddess."
My heart swells to bursting, and I am afire with desire, with need…with love. In this moment, at least, there is nothing but us. Everything else is out there, beyond these walls. Beyond his arms.
"You make me feel like one," I whisper.
"Good. Youshouldfeel like one."
He slumps back and gazes at me, letting his eyes roam my naked form. He studies me greedily, taking in my face, my hair, my throat…my breasts, lingering there as if hooked, dipping down to my belly, my thighs, the shadowed space between them.
"So fucking beautiful," he breathes, and I am not certain the words were even meant for my ears, but were torn from his soul by the mere sight of me; my blood sings. "You wet for me, honey?"
"I do not know," I answer, lying through my eager, mischievous smile. "Perhaps you should find out."
"I think I will." He lifts, leans into me.
His hand cups the back of my head and pulls me down into a kiss, and this one is rough with need. The exquisite delicacy of earlier is gone, replaced by ravenous need. His mouth is hungry, and he nips my lower lip hard enough that I squeak in surprise—but the squeak becomes a growl so low and feral it startles even me. I follow it by scraping my nails through the beard along his jaw.
"I like this," I whisper. "Very, very much."
"You do?" he murmurs. "Wasn't sure how it'd go with your sensory issues."
"It is sweet of you to consider that," I answer. "My sensory issues find it delightful." I grip the beard and use it to pull him to me, and I kiss him, scour his mouth with my tongue, giving in to every urge without hesitation. "It makes you look ruggedanddistinguished."
He chuckles. "Distinguished? That's a new one." The laugh fades, and he cups the back of my head and tilts me backward.
I give him my weight, trusting him to hold me. He dips me to a forty-five degree angle and leans over me, supporting me with one hand and cupping my breast with the other, offering it to his greedy mouth. I whimper as his lips brush my erect nipple, and then gasp when he flicks his tongue against it. His beard is rough and scratchy yet still somehow soft against my flesh, creating a maddening juxtaposition of sensations. If I were not wet before, I am now. He suckles my nipple, and heat slams through me,tightening behind my belly and swelling into wetness leaking from my folds.
I arch my back, push my breast against his mouth, clinging to his nape with both hands. He slides his lips to my other breast, worships there with lips and tongue and breath. Riley lifts me upright and then stands, taking me with him. I wrap my legs around his waist, feeling my naked sex smearing my desire against his bare, hot belly, and I cling to his shoulders and bury my face in the side of his neck, taste flesh as I kiss him there greedily, and then kiss his throat, rough stubble below the neckline of his beard like sandpaper on my lips. He groans, tips his head back to offer me access, which I eagerly take, kissing his throat, his jawline, behind his ears, his temples. He grips my bottom with greedy hands, groaning and growling as I kiss his cheekbones, his eyelids, the side of his nose, the tender strip of skin between sideburn and the tragus of his ear.
"Need to taste you, Cadie," he murmurs.
I feel wild, frenzied with desire—need for Riley is a volcanic heat in my core, spreading like wildfire to my extremities, short-circuiting my brain so my need for his body, his touch, his kisses, his heat and muscles and hardness and intoxicating masculine brawn take over all of my higher functions.
"Please," I whisper, my lips moving against the shell of his ear, hissing against his helix. "Taste me. Take me. I need you, Riley Crowe of Three Rivers."
He pivots on his heel and marches toward his bedroom, kicking it closed with a loud slam that makes me jump in his embrace, giggling as he snarls against my cleavage. And then I am airborne, hurled bodily onto the bed. The mattress greets me, bounces me weightless for an instant.
